27 Comments
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Does anybody have difficulty with "antaux sep jaroj" for "seven years ago" like me? Why is "antaux" in front?
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The question is really, "why is 'ago' at the back?" It's one of the very few postpositions that English has. ("notwithstanding" is another one, though that can also come before a noun - "notwithstanding his dislike of the war = his dislike of the war notwithstanding, ....")
We have "for five years", "in five years", "by tomorrow", "on Tuesday", "during the week", all with prepositions... but "five years ago" rather than "before five years" the way (say) German does it.
Esperanto uses a preposition here, which seems unremarkable to me.
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In my opinion, "five years ago" and "five years before" mean approximately the same thing, but "before five years" does not. The last would imply that she got married earlier than five years into the relationship. Thoughts?
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For me, "five years ago" and "five years before" do not mean the same thing - "five years ago" means "five years before the present moment" while "five years before = five years previously = five years before the moment we are talking about (which is often in the past)".
And "before five years" doesn't work for me on its own at all; I'd have to expand it to "before five years had passed" or "before five years were up" or "before five years had elapsed" or some other phrase with a verb in it.
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my two cents: in Russian we say пять лет назад (the same word order as in five years ago). So also for me the Esperanto version is a bit confusing
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I translated it as "She has been married for 7 years" and was marked wrong. The meanings seem to be identical. Reported it.
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The meanings are not identical.
If she got married seven years ago and was divorced two years later, then Ŝi edziniĝis antaŭ sep jaroj is true but "She has been married for 7 years" is not.
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Vi pravas - Dankon the meanings are only identical under certain conditions : )
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I did the same think as EricHParker, and am thus wondering, how would you say "She has been married for 7 years" in Esperanto? Ŝi estas edzino antaŭ sep jaroj? Directly translated that would be "She has been a wife for 7 years", which wouldn't necessarily be to the same person/consecutively.
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I think I see the difference now - antaŭ sep jaroj is "seven years ago", and "jam sep jarojn" is "for the past seven years". Dankon!
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Ŝi estas edzino antaŭ sep jaroj does not mean "She has been a wife for 7 years" but rather "She was a wife 7 years ago". (Literally, "She was a wife before 7 years".)
